AUGUST 18, 1997:
My mother called me two weeks ago to let me know that the Woolworth's
on the Santa Fe Plaza would be closing down. I hung up the phone
and sat at my desk, heartbroken. I went home that night and borrowed
my friend's Nanci Griffith CD, hit No. 5 on my player--"Love
at the Five and Dime"--and played it over and over. It is
a song about falling in love at a Woolworth's, which I did several
years ago. That love is long gone, and very soon so will every
Woolworth's store be.

In 1879, a man named Frank Woolworth opened what we once called
a five-and-dime store. Spread all across the country, these stores
sold sundries and canned goods, toys and records, as well as serving
hamburgers and such right off the grill, followed up with a big
ol' chocolate ice cream soda. As a kid growing up in Las Cruces
and Albuquerque, I was in heaven over the idea that each town
we moved to had my favorite place in the world. In college, there
was a store in downtown Durango, Colo., which helped me keep under
budget and well stocked as a poor first-year college student.
Years later, I began to spend time in Santa Fe. Everyone in this
town seemed to love and guard their Woolworth's on the
Plaza. As many businesses moved in on the Plaza, like Banana Republic,
Ann Taylor and Garduños, the locals became restless. Rumors
of corporations like the Gap coming in and taking over the space
would make residents turn red with anger. It was a regular topic
of discussion: If the Woolworth's were to close, the biggest concern
was "Where will we get a good Frito pie?"

I don't know why, but this place had the best Frito pie I have
ever tasted. I know this is not an epicurean favorite of everyone,
but it was definitely a favorite at the Woolworth's in Santa Fe.
Tourists would hear about it from far away and venture in as part
of their sightseeing. A $3 pie, loaded with Frito chips, yummy
beans and extra jalapeños, a big fountain Coca-Cola, and
I was a happy boy. It was over a couple of these tasty treats
in the fall of 1989 that I fell in love for the first time. I
knew it was going to happen, but it was here, in the narrow, orange
booths lined up by the grill, that I looked into this person's
eyes and my life changed. As short-lived as that turned out to
be, I never stopped returning to the grill to get my fill of one
of my favorite meals.

It's strange that at a time when Santa Fe is lamenting the loss
of their old mercantile, a few miles away on the backside of the
Sandia Mountains the residents of Cedar Crest are in an uproar
about the possibility of a Wal-Mart store moving into their quaint
neighborhood. The townsfolk feel that their sense of community
will be hindered by a 139,000 square-foot retail store. There
are more than 55 family owned businesses dotting the historic
Turquoise Trail, and they want to keep it that way. It's a matter
of history--the Woolworth's on the Plaza always fit into its surrounding
with grace. But how can the Wal-Mart even hope to do the same?

I went in to visit my Woolworth's for the last time two Saturdays
ago. In the midst of the Spanish Market on the Plaza, the store
was in a flurry. They were selling everything at 30 percent off
and people were snatching up items you know they didn't need.
It reminded me of something Griffith says in her ballad about
passing a Woolworth's in London as a child, dreaming of getting
out of the car and "filling her suitcase with unnecessary
plastic products." She also describes the smell of these
stores as something like popcorn and bubble gum rubbed together
on the bottom of a leather sole shoe. And at this particular moment,
I knew what she meant.

I decided to get myself one last Frito pie and say goodbye. I
pushed through the crowd toward the counter. All the booths were
crowded with people--not the old locals I would have recognized
after all these years, but weary shoppers who were not even eating.
After standing in line for what seemed like forever, I glanced
at the back of the register and saw taped there a flimsy paper
plate serving as a poorly-written makeshift sign. It read: "No
More Frito Pie."

I left, feeling warm and a little sad. Everything in my life that
I have loved and lost still remains in a place in my heart. Woolworth's
just went there. And Nanci was singing, "'Cuz it's closing
time/And love's on sale tonight/At this five and dime."